Etymology

The name Sardinia is from the pre-Roman noun *sard-, romanised as sardus (feminine sarda); that the name had a religious connotation is suggested from its use also as the adjective for the ancient Sardinian mythological hero-god Sardus Pater "Sardinian Father" (in modern times misunderstood as being "Father Sardus"), as well as being the stem of the adjective "sardonic". Sardinia was called Ichnusa (the Latinised form of the Greek Hyknousa, Υκνούσσα), Sandàlion (Σανδάλιον in Greek, meaning ‘sandal’), Sardinia and Sardó (Σαρδώ) by the Romans and the ancient Greeks.

Geography

Sardinia is the second largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, with an area of 23,821 square kilometres (9,197 sq mi). It is situated between 38° 51' and 41° 15' latitude north and 8° 8' and 9° 50' east longitude. To the west of Sardinia is the Sea of Sardinia, a unit of the Mediterranean Sea; to Sardinia's east is the Tyrrhenian Sea, which is also an element of the Mediterranean Sea.[5]

The coasts of Sardinia (1,849 kilometres (1,149 miles) long) are generally high and rocky, with long, relatively straight stretches of coastline, many outstanding headlands, a few wide, deep bays, rias, many inlets and with various smaller islands off the coast.

The island has an ancient geoformation and, unlike Sicily and mainland Italy, is not earthquake-prone. Its rocks date from the Palaeozoic Era (up to 500 million years old). Due to long erosion processes, the island's highlands, formed of granite, schist, trachyte, basalt (called jaras or gollei), sandstone and dolomite limestone (called tonneri or "heels"), average at between 300 to 1,000 metres (984 to 3,281 feet). The highest peak is Punta La Marmora (1,834 m (6,017 ft)), part of the Gennargentu Ranges in the centre of the island. Other mountain chains are Monte Limbara (1,362 m (4,469 ft)) in the northeast, the Chain of Marghine and Goceano (1,259 m (4,131 ft)) running crosswise for 40 kilometres (25 miles) towards the north, the Monte Albo (1,057 m (3,468 ft)), the Sette Fratelli Range in the southeast, and the Sulcis Mountains and the Monte Linas (1,236 m (4,055 ft)). The island's ranges and plateaux are separated by wide alluvial valleys and flatlands, the main ones being the Campidano in the southwest between Oristano and Cagliari and the Nurra in the northwest.

A proportionate graph of Sardinian topography: 13.6% of the island is mountainous, 18.5% is flat, and 67.9% is hilly.

Sardinia has few major rivers, the largest being the Tirso, 151 km (94 mi) long, which flows into the Sea of Sardinia, the Coghinas (115 km) and the Flumendosa (127 km). There are 54 artificial lakes and dams that supply water and electricity. The main ones are Lake Omodeo and Lake Coghinas. The only natural freshwater lake is Lago di Baratz. A number of large, shallow, salt-water lagoons and pools are located along the 1,850 km (1,150 mi) of the coastline.

Climate

The island has a Mediterranean climate (Köppen: Csa) along the coasts, plains and low hills and a continental climate on the interior plateaus, valleys and mountain ranges. During the year there are approximately 135 days of sunshine, with a major concentration of rainfall in the winter and autumn, some heavy showers in the spring and snowfalls in the highlands. The average temperature is between 11 to 17 °C (52 to 63 °F), with mild winters and hot summers on the coasts ( 9 to 11 °C (48 to 52 °F) in January, 23 to 26 °C (73 to 79 °F) in July), and cold winters and cool summers on the mountains ( −2 to 4 °C (28 to 39 °F) in January, 16 to 20 °C (61 to 68 °F) in July).

Sardinia average rainfalls

Rainfall has a Mediterranean distribution all over the island, with almost totally rainless summers and wet autumns, winters and springs. However, in summer, the rare rainfalls can be characterized by short but severe thunderstorms, which can cause flash floods. The climate is also heavily influenced by the vicinity of the Gulf of Genoa (barometric low) and the relative proximity of the Atlantic Ocean. Low pressures in autumn can generate the formation of the so-called Medicanes, extratropical cyclones which affect the Mediterranean basin. In 2013, the island was hit by several cyclones, included the Cyclone Cleopatra, which dumped almost 18 inches (450 mm) of rainfall within an hour and a half.[6] Sardinia being relatively large and hilly, weather is not uniform; in particular the East is drier, but paradoxically it suffers the worst rainstorms : in autumn 2009, it rained more than 200 mm (7.9 in) in a single day in Siniscola, and 19 November 2013, locations in Sardinia were reported to have received more than 431 mm (17 inches) within two hours. The western coast has a higher distribution of rainfalls even for modest elevations (for instance Iglesias, elevation 200 m (656 ft), average annual precipitation 815 mm (32.1 in)). The driest part of the island is the coast of Cagliari gulf, with less than 450 mm (17.7 in) per year, the minimum is at Capo Carbonara at the extreme south-east of the island 381 mm (15.0 in),[7] and the wettest is the top of the Gennargentu mountain with almost 1,500 mm (59.1 in) per year. The average for the entire island is about 800 mm (31.5 in) per year, which is more than enough for the needs of the population and vegetation.[8] The Mistral from the northwest is the dominant wind on and off throughout the year, though it is most prevalent in winter and spring. It can blow quite strongly, but it is usually dry and cool and makes for a sailor's paradise.

During the early Bronze Age, the so-called Beaker culture, coming from Continental Europe, appeared in Sardinia. These new people predominantly settled on the west coast, where the majority of the sites attributed to them had been found.[12]

As time passed, the different Sardinian populations appear to have become united in customs, yet remained politically divided into various small, tribal groupings, at times banding together, and at others waging war against each other. Habitations consisted of round thatched stone huts.

Nuragic civilization

From about 1500 BC onwards, villages were built around round tower-fortresses called nuraghi[13] (singular form "Nuraghe", usually pluralized in English as "Nuraghes"). These towers were often reinforced and enlarged with battlements. Tribal boundaries were guarded by smaller lookout Nuraghes erected on strategic hills commanding a view of other territories.

Today, some 7,000 Nuraghes dot the Sardinian landscape. While initially these Nuraghes had a relatively simple structure, with time they became extremely complex and monumental (see for example Nuraghe Santu Antine, Su Nuraxi, or Nuraghe Arrubiu). The scale, complexity and territorial spread of these buildings attest to the level of wealth accumulated by the Nuragic people, their advances in technology and the complexity of their society, which was able to coordinate large numbers of people with different roles for the purpose of building the monumental Nuraghes.

The Nuraghes are not the only Nuragic buildings that survive, as there are several sacred wells around Sardinia and other buildings that had religious purposes such as the Giants' grave (monumental collective tombs) and collections of religious buildings that probably served as destinations for pilgrimage and mass religious rites (e.g. Su Romanzesu near Bitti).

Sardinia was at the time at the centre of several commercial routes and it was an important provider of raw materials such as copper and lead, which were pivotal for the manufacture of the time. By controlling the extraction of these raw materials and by commercing them with other countries, the Nuragic civilisation was able to accumulate wealth and reach a level of sophistication that is not only reflected in the complexity of its surviving buildings, but also in its artworks (e.g. the votive bronze statuettes found across Sardinia).

According to some scholars, the Nuragic people(s) are identifiable with the Shardana, a tribe of the "Sea Peoples".[14]

The Nuragic civilization was linked with other contemporaneous megalithic civilization of the western Mediterranean, such as the Talaiotic culture of the Balearic islands and the Torrean civilization of southern Corsica. Evidence of trade with the other civilizations of that time are attested by several artefacts (e.g. pots), coming from as far as Cyprus, Crete, Mainland Greece, Spain as well as from Italy, that have been found in Nuragic sites, which testifies the scope of commercial relations between the Nuragic people and other peoples in Europe and beyond.

Ancient history

Around 9th century BC the Phoenicians began visiting Sardinia with increasing frequency, presumably initially needing safe over-night and/or all-weather anchorages along their trade routes from the coast of modern-day Lebanon as far afield as the African and European Atlantic coasts and beyond. The most common ports of call were Caralis, Nora, Bithia, Sulci, and Tharros.

While the Phoenicians stuck to the coastline, their relationship with the Sardinians was peaceful.[15] However, after a few hundred years of habitation, they began expanding inward. They took over valuable natural resources, such as silver and lead mines, and established a military presence in the form of a fortress on Monte Sira in 650 BC. The Sardinians resented these intrusions, and in 509 BC they mounted a series of attacks against Phoenician settlements. The Phoenician settlers called on Carthage for help, and when it arrived they successfully took control of part of the southern part of the island.[16]

In 238 BC, the Carthaginians, as a result of their defeat by the Romans in the First Punic War, surrendered Corsica and Sardinia to Rome, and together they became a Roman province. The existing coastal cities were enlarged and embellished, while Coloniae such as Turris Lybissonis and Feronia were founded. These were populated by Roman immigrants. The Roman military occupation brought the Nuragic civilization to an end, except for the mountainous interior of the island, which the Romans called Barbaria, meaning "Land populated by Barbarians". Roman domination of Sardinia lasted 694 years, during which it was an important source of grain for the capital. Latin came to be the dominant spoken language of Sardinia during this period, though Roman culture was slower to take hold, and Roman rule was often contested by the inhabitants of Sardinia's mountainous central regions.

Vandal conquest

The east Germanic tribe of the Vandals conquered Sardinia in 456. Their rule lasted for 78 years up to 534, when eastern Roman troops under Cyrillus retook the island. It is known that the Vandal government continued the forms of the existing Roman Imperial structure. The governor of Sardinia continued to be called the praeses and apparently continued to manage military, judicial, and civil governmental functions via imperial procedures. (This continuity was not novel to Sardinia; like the Visigoths, the Vandals generally maintained the pretence of the empire, nominally acknowledging Constantinople and declaring themselves its deputies.) The only Vandal governor of Sardinia about whom there is substantial record is the last, Godas, a Visigoth noble. In AD 530, a coup d'état in Carthage removed King Hilderic, a convert to Nicene Christianity, in favor of his cousin Gelimer, an Arian Christian like most of the élite in his kingdom. Godas was sent to take charge and ensure the loyalty of Sardinia. He did the exact opposite, declaring the island's independence from Carthage and opening negotiations with Emperor Justinian I, who had declared war on Hilderic's behalf. In AD 533 Gelimer sent the bulk of his army to Sardinia to subdue Godas, with the catastrophic result that the Vandal Kingdom was overwhelmed when Justinian's own army under Belisarius arrived in their absence. The Vandal Kingdom ended and Sardinia was returned to Roman rule.[17]

Byzantine era

In AD 533, Sardinia returned to the rule of the Eastern Roman Empire (in this period sometimes referred to as the Byzantine Empire) when the Vandals were defeated by the armies of Justinian I under the General Belisarius in the Battle of Tricamarum, in their African kingdom; Belisarius sent his general Cyrillus to Sardinia to retake the island. Sardinia remained in Byzantine hands for the next 300 years[18] aside from a short period in which it was invaded by the Ostrogoths in 551.

Under Byzantine rule, the island was divided into districts called merèie (μερείαι in Byzantine Greek), which were governed by a judge residing in Caralis (Cagliari) and garrisoned by an army stationed in Forum Traiani (today Fordongianus) under the command of a dux. During this time, Christianity took deeper root on the island, supplanting the Paganism which had survived into the early Medieval era in the culturally conservative hinterlands. Along with lay Christianity, the followers of monastic figures such as St. Basil became established in Sardinia. While Christianity penetrated the majority of the population, the region of Barbagia remained largely pagan. Towards the end of the 6th century, a short-lived independent principality established itself in Barbagia and returned to the local traditional religions. One of its princes, Ospitone, conducted raids on the neighbouring Christian communities controlled by the Byzantine dux Zabarda. He was later reprimanded by Pope Gregory I within a letter for "Living, all like irrational animals, ignorant of the true God and worshipping wood and stone"[19] In 594, Ospitone was convinced by Gregory the Great to convert to Christianity after receiving the papal letter. His followers, however, were not immediately convinced and ostracised their prince for a short time before they themselves converted.[20]

The dates and circumstances of the end of Byzantine rule in Sardinia are not known. Direct central control was maintained at least through c. 650, after which local legates were empowered in the face of the rebellion of Gregory the Patrician, Exarch of Africa and the first invasion of the Umayyads in North Africa. There is some evidence that senior Byzantine administration in the Exarchate of Africa retreated to Cagliari following the final fall of Carthage to the Arabs in 697.[21] The loss of imperial control in Africa led to escalating Moorish and Berber raids on the island, the first of which is documented in 705, forcing increased military self-reliance in the province.[22] Communication with the central government became daunting if not impossible during and after the Muslim conquest of Sicily between 827 and 902. A letter by Pope Nicholas I as early as 864 mentions the "Sardinian judges", without reference to the empire and a letter by Pope John VIII (reigned 872-882) refers to them as principes ("princes"). By the time of De Administrando Imperio, completed in 952, the Byzantine authorities no longer listed Sardinia as an imperial province, suggesting they considered it lost.[21]

Whether this final transformation from imperial civil servant to independent sovereign resulted from imperial abandonment or local assertion, by the 10th century, the giudici (Sardinian: judikes / Latin: iudices, literally ‘judges’, a Byzantine administrative title) had emerged as the autonomous rulers of Sardinia. The title of iudice changed with the language and local understanding of the position, becoming the Sardinian judike, essentially a king or sovereign, while giudicato (Sardinian: judicadu), literally ‘judgeship’ or ‘judicature’, came to mean both ‘State’ and ‘palace’ or ‘capital’.

Medieval history

Early medieval Sardinian political institutions evolved from the millennium old Roman imperial structures with relatively little Germanic influence.

Although the Giudicati were hereditary lordships, the old Roman/Byzantine imperial notion that personal title or honor was separate from the state still remained, so the Giudicato was not regarded as the personal property of the monarch as was common in later European feudalism. Like the imperial systems, the new order also preserved "semi-democratic" forms, with national assemblies called Corona de Logu. Each Giudicato saw to its own defense, maintained its own laws and administration, and looked after its own foreign and trading affairs.[23]

In the 10th century there were five known Giudicati on Sardinia, but the annexation of the Giudicato of Agugliastra by that of Cagliari sometime in the 10th or 11th century stabilized the number at four. The history of the four Giudicati would be defined by the contest for influence between the rival rising sea powers of Genoa and Pisa, and later the ambitions of the Kingdom of Aragon.

The Giudicato of Cagliari, during the regency of Torchitorio V and his successor William III, was allied with the Republic of Genoa. For this it was brought to an end in 1258, when its capital, Santa Igia, was stormed and destroyed by an alliance of Sardinian and Pisan forces. The territory then was divided between Pisa, the della Gherardesca family and the Giudicati of Arborea e Gallura.

The Giudicato of Arborea, having Oristano as its capital, had a longer life compared to the other kingdoms. Its later history is entwined with the attempt to unify the island into a single Sardinian state (Republica Sardisca) against their relatives and former Aragonese allies.

In 1297, Pope Boniface VIII established on his own initiative (motu proprio) a hypothetical regnum Sardiniae et Corsicae ("Kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica") in order to settle the War of the Vespers diplomatically. This had broken out in 1282 between the Angevins and Aragonese over the possession of Sicily. Despite the existence of the indigenous states, the Pope offered this newly created crown to James II of Aragon, promising him support should he wish to conquer Pisan Sardinia in exchange for Sicily.

The proclamation of the Republic of Sassari. The Sassarese republic lasted from 1272 until 1323, when it sided with the new born Kingdom of Sardinia.

In 1324, in alliance with the Kingdom of Arborea and following a military campaign that lasted a year or so, led by the Catalan-Aragonese Crown Prince Alfonso, the Catalan-Aragonese army occupied the Pisan territories of Cagliari and Gallura along with the allied city of Sassari, naming them "The Kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica". The kingdom was to remain a dominion of the Crown of Aragon (under the Kings of Spain) until the Treaty of Utrecht.

During this period, the Giudicato of Arborea promulgated the legal code of the kingdom in the Carta de Logu (‘Charter of the Land’). The Carta de Logu was originally compiled by Marianus IV of Arborea, and was amended and updated by Mariano's daughter, Queen Eleanor of Arborea. The legal code was written in Sardinian and established a whole range of citizens' rights. Among the revolutionary concepts in this Carta de Logu was the right of women to refuse marriage and to own property. In terms of civil liberties, the code made provincial 14th century Sardinia one of the most developed societies in all of Europe.[24]

Sartiglia of Oristano, horse race of medieval origin, established in 1358

In 1353, Peter IV of Aragon, following Aragonese customs, granted a parliament to the kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica, which was followed by some degree of self-government under a viceroy and judicial independence. This parliament, however, had limited powers. It consisted of high-ranking military commanders, the clergy and the nobility. The kingdom of Aragon also introduced the feudal system into the areas of Sardinia that it ruled.

The Sardinian Giudicati never adopted feudalism, and Arborea maintained its parliament called the Corona de Logu. In this parliament, apart from the nobles and military commanders, also sat the representatives of each township and village. The Corona de Logu exercised some control over the king: under the rule of the bannus consensus the king could be deposed or even killed if he did not follow the rules of the kingdom.

In 1409, Martin I of Sicily, king of Sicily and heir to the crown of Aragon, defeated the Sardinians at the Battle of Sanluri. The battle was fought by about 20,000 Sardinian, Genoese and French knights, enrolled from their kingdom at a time when the population of Sardinia had been greatly depleted by the plague. Despite the Sardinian army outnumbering the Aragonese army, they were defeated.

The giudicato of Arborea disappeared in 1420, when its rights were sold by the last king for 100,000 gold florins, and after some of its most notable men switched sides in exchange for privileges. For example, Leonardo Cubello, with some claim to the crown being from a family related to the Kings of Arborea, was granted the title of Marquis of Oristano and feudal rights on a territory that partly overlapped with the original extension of the Kingdom of Arborea in exchange for his subjection to the King of Aragon.

The conquest of Sardinia by the Kingdom of Aragon meant the introduction of the feudal system throughout Sardinia. Thus Sardinia is probably the only European country where feudalism was introduced in the transition period from the Medieval to the Modern Era, at a time when feudalism had already been abandoned by many other European countries.

Modern history

Flag of the Kingdom of Sardinia (center) at the funeral of Charles I of Spain

The Kingdom of Sardinia remained Spanish for approximately 400 years, from 1323 to 1708, assimilating a number of Spanish traditions, customs and linguistic expressions, nowadays vividly portrayed in the folklore parades of Saint Efisio in Cagliari (1 May), the Cavalcade on Sassari (last but one Sunday in May), and the Redeemer in Nuoro (28 August). To this day Catalan is spoken in the western city of Alghero (l'Alguer).

Many famines have been reported in Sardinia. According to Stephen L. Dyson and Robert J. Rowland, "The Jesuits of Cagliari recorded years during the late 16th century "of such hunger and so sterile that the majority of the people could sustain life only with wild ferns and other weeds" ... During the terrible famine of 1680, some 80,000 people, out of a total population of 250,000, are said to have died, and entire villages were devastated..."[25]

In 1793, Sardinians repelled two French invasions. On 23 February 1793, Domenico Millelire, commanding the Sardinian fleet, defeated the fleets of the French Republic near the Maddalena archipelago, of which then-lieutenant Napoleon Bonaparte was a leader.[29] Millelire became the first recipient of the Gold Medal of Military Valor of the Italian Armed Forces. In the same month, Sardinians stopped the attempted French landing on the beach of Quartu Sant'Elena, near the Capital of Cagliari. Because of these successes, the representatives of nobility and clergy (Stamenti) formulated five requests addressed to the King Victor Amadeus III of Sardinia, but they got refused. Because of this discontent, on 28 April 1794, during an uprising in Cagliari, two Savoyard officials were killed. That was the start of a revolt (called the "Moti rivoluzionari sardi" or "Vespri sardi") in the island, which culminated in the expulsion of the Piedmontese officers for a few days from the Capital Cagliari. On 28 December 1795 in Sassari insurgents demonstrating against feudalism, mainly from the region of Logudoro, occupied the city. On 13 February 1796, in order to prevent the spread of the revolt, the viceroy Filippo Vivalda gave the Sardinian magistrate Giovanni Maria Angioy the role of Alternos, which meant a substitute of the viceroy himself. Angioy moved from Cagliari to Sassari, and during his journey almost all the villages joined the uprising, demanding an end to feudalism and aiming to declare the island to be a republic,[30] but once he was outnumbered by loyalist forces he fled to Paris and sought support for a French annexation of the island.

In 1798 the islet near Sardinia was attacked by the Tunisians and over 900 inhabitants were taken away as slaves.[31] The final Muslim attack on the island was on Sant'Antioco on 16 October 1815, over a millennium since the first.[32]

In 1799, as a consequence of the Napoleonic Wars in Italy, the Savoy royal family left Turin and took refuge in Cagliari for some fifteen years. In 1847, the Sardinian parliaments (Stamenti), in order to get the Piedmontese liberal reforms they could not afford due to their separated legal system, renounced their state autonomy and agreed to form a union with Piedmont, Savoy, Nice and Liguria in order to have a single parliament, a single magistracy and a single government in Turin; most of the pro-union supporters, including its leader Giovanni Siotto Pintor, would later regret it.[33]

Costumes of Sardinia, 1880s.

In 1848, the confederation of states powered by the Savoyard kings of Sardinia became a unitarian and constitutional state and moved to the Italian Wars of Independence for the Unification of Italy, that were led for thirteen years. In 1861, being Italy united by a debated war campaign, the parliament of the Kingdom of Sardinia decided by law to change its name and the title of its king in Kingdom of Italy and King of Italy.

During the Fascist period, with the implementation of the policy of autarky, several swamps around the island were reclaimed and agrarian communities founded. The main communities were in the area of Oristano, where the village of Mussolinia (now called Arborea) was located, and in the area adjacent the city of Alghero, within the region of Nurra, Fertilia was founded. Also established during that time was the city of Carbonia, which became the main centre of mining activity. Works to dry the numerous waste lands and the reprise of mining activities favored the arrival of many settlers from the Italian mainland; at first, they were mostly from the region of Veneto, but after World War II they were followed by a notable number of Istrian Italians and Dalmatian Italians, hailing from territories lost to Yugoslavia.

During the Second World War, Sardinia was an important air and naval base and was heavily bombed by the Allies, especially the city of Cagliari. German troops left the island on 8 September 1943, a few days after the Armistice of Cassibile, and retired to Corsica without fighting and bloodshed, after a bilateral agreement between the general Antonio Basso (Commander of the Armed Forces of Sardinia) and the German Karl Hans Lungerhausen, general of the 90th Panzergrenadier Division.[34]

Post-World War II period

In 1946, by popular referendum, Italy became a republic, with Sardinia being administered since 1948 by a special statute of autonomy. By 1951, malaria was successfully eliminated by the ERLAAS, Anti-malaric Regional Authority, and the support of the Rockefeller Foundation, which facilitated the commencement of the Sardinian tourist boom. With the increase in tourism, coal decreased in importance but Sardinia followed the Italian economic miracle.

In the early 1960s, an industrialisation effort was commenced, the so-called Piani di Rinascita (rebirth plans), with the initiation of major infrastructure projects on the island. These included the construction of new dams and roads, reforestation, agricultural zones on reclaimed marshland, and large industrial complexes (primarily oil refineries and related petrochemical operations). With the creation of petrochemicalindustries, thousands of ex-farmers became industrial workers. The 1973 oil crisis caused the termination of employment for thousands of workers employed in the petrochemical industries, which aggravated the emigration already present in the 1950s and 1960s.

Sardinia faced the creation of military bases on the island, like Decimomannu Air Base and Salto di Quirra (the biggest scientific military base in Europe) in the same decades. Even now, around 60% of all Italian and NATO military installations in Italy are on Sardinia, whose area is less than one-tenth of all the Italian territory and whose population is little more than the 2.5%;[35] furthermore, they comprise over 35.000 hectares used for experimental weapons testing.[36][37]

Sardinian nationalism and local protest movements became stronger in the 1970s, and a number of bandits (bandìdos) started a long series of kidnappings, which ended only in the 1990s.[38] This also gave rise to various militant groups that blended separatist and communist ideas, the most famous being Barbagia Rossa and the Movimento Armato Sardo,[39] which perpetrated several bombings and terrorist actions between the 1970s and the early 1980s.[40][41][42]

In 1983 a prominent activist of a separatist party, the Sardinian Action Party (Partidu Sardu - Partito Sardo d'Azione), was elected president of the regional parliament, and in the 1980s several other movements calling for independence from Italy were born; in the 1990s some of them became political parties, even if in a rather disjointed manner. It was not until 1999 that the island's languages (Sardinian, Sassarese, Gallurese, Algherese and Tabarchino) were recognised, even if just formally, together with Italian. The 35th G8 summit was planned by Prodi II Cabinet to be held in Sardinia, on the island of La Maddalena, in July 2009; however, in April 2009, the Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi, decided, without convoking the Italian parliament or consulting the Sardinian governor of his own party, to move the summit, even though the works were almost completed, to L'Aquila, provoking heavy protests.

Today Sardinia is phasing in as an EU region, with a diversified economy focused on tourism and the tertiary sector. The economic efforts of the last twenty years have reduced the handicap of insularity, especially in the fields of low-cost air travel and advanced information technology. For example, the CRS4 (Center for Advanced Studies, Research and Development in Sardinia) developed the second European website and 1st in Italy in 1991 [43] and webmail in 1995. CRS4 allowed several telecommunication companies and internet service providers based on the island to flourish, such as Videonline in 1994, Tiscali in 1998 and Andala Umts in 1999.

Education

According to the ISTAT census of 2001, the literacy rate in Sardinia among people below 64 years old is 99.5 percent. Total literacy rate (including people over 65) is 98.2 percent.[44][45] Illiteracy rate among males below 65 years old is 0.24 percent and among women 0.25 percent;[44] the number of women that annually graduate at secondary high schools and universities is about 10-20 percent higher than men.[46][47] However, in spite of these findings, Sardinia has actually the highest rate of school and university drop-out in Italy.[48]

Economy

Taken as a whole, Sardinia's economic conditions are such that the island is in the best position among Italian regions located south of Rome. The greatest economic development had taken place inland, in the provinces of Cagliari and Sassari, characterized by a certain amount of enterprise. According to Eurostat, the 2011 GDP was 33,075 millions €, 32,377 in Purchasing power parity resulting in €19,300 GDP per capita that is the 77% of the European Union one. The per capita income in Sardinia is the highest of the southern half of Italy. The most populated provincial chief towns have higher incomes: in Cagliari the income per capita is €27,545, in Sassari €24,006, in Oristano €23,887, in Nuoro is €23,316 and in Olbia is €20.827.[50]

The Sardinian economy is, however, constrained due to the high costs of the transportation of goods and electricity, which is twice that of the continental Italian regions, and triple that of the EU average. Sardinia is the only Italian region that produces a surplus of electricity, and exports electricity to Corsica and the Italian mainland: in 2009, the new submarine power cableSapei entered into operation, it links the Fiume Santo Power Station, in Sardinia, to the converter stations in Latina, in the Italian peninsula, the SACOI is another submarine power cable that links Sardinia to Italy, crossing Corsica, from 1965. The submarine gas pipeline GALSI would have brought Algerian gas to the Italian mainland through the island.

The unemployment rate for the fourth quarter of 2008 was 8.6%; by 2012, the unemployment rate had increased to 14,6%.[51] Its rise was due to the global financial crisis that hit Sardinian exports, mainly focused on refined oil, chemical products, and also mining and metallurgical products.

There are chances for Sardinia to become a tax haven, the whole island territory being free by custom duties, vat and excise taxes on fuel; since February 2013, the town of Portoscuso has become the first free trade zone.[52][53][54][55][56][57] According to the article 12 of the Sardinian Statute modified by the regional parliament in October 2013: "The Territory of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia is located off the customs line and constitutes a Free Trade Zone enclosed by the surrounding sea; the access points consist of the seaports and the airports. The Sardinian Free Trade Zone is regulated by the laws of the European Union and Italy that are in force also in Livigno, Campione D'Italia, Gorizia, Savogna d'Isonzo and the Region of Aosta Valley".

Primary

The soil of Sardinia is exploited to 60% for breeding, 20% for agriculture and the rest is occupied by closed forests, urban areas and areas that are not exploitable. Sicily practically has reversed percentages and, with the same extension, almost three times the inhabitants of Sardinia. Sardinia is home to nearly 4 million sheep,[59] almost half of the entire Italian assets and that makes the island one of the areas of the world with the highest density of sheep along with some parts of UK and New Zealand (135 sheep every square kilometer versus 129 in UK and 116 in New Zealand). The soils of Sardinia are largely underpowered, shallow and therefore not very productive for agriculture. Sardinia has been for thousands of years specializing in sheep breeding, and, to a lesser extent, goats and cattle that is less productive of agriculture in relation to land use. It is probably in breeding and cattle ownership the economic base of the early proto-historic and monumental Sardinian civilization from Neolithic to the Iron Age.

Even agriculture has played a very important role in the economic history of the island, especially in the great plain of Campidano, particularly suitable for wheat farming. The Sardinian soils, even those plains are slightly permeable, with aquifers of lacking and sometimes brackish water and very small natural reserves. Water scarcity was the first problem that was faced for the modernization of the sector, with the construction of a great barrier system of dams, which today contains nearly 2 billion cubic meters of water.[60] The Sardinian agriculture is now linked to specific products such as cheese, wine, olive oil, artichoke, tomato for a growing product export. The reclamations have helped to extend the crops and to introduce other ones such as vegetables and fruit, next to the historical ones, olive and grapes that are present in the hilly areas. The Campidano plain, the largest lowland Sardinian produces oats, barley and durum, of which is one of the most important Italian producers. Among the vegetables, as well as artichokes, has a certain weight the production of oranges, and, before the reform of the sugar sector from the European Union, the cultivation of sugar beet. In the forests there is the cork oak, which grows naturally; Sardinia produces about 80% of Italian cork. In fresh food, as well as artichokes, the production of tomatoes (including Camoni tomato) and citrus fruit are of a certain weight. Sardinia is the 5th Italian region for rice production, the main paddy fields are located in the Arborea Plain.[61]

In addition to meat, Sardinia produces a wide variety of cheese, considering that half of the sheep milk produced in Italy is produced in Sardinia, and is largely worked by the cooperatives of the shepherds and small industries.[62] Sardinia also produces most of the pecorino romano, a non-original product of the island, much of which is traditionally addressed to the Italian overseas communities. Sardinia boasts a centuries-old tradition of horse breeding since the Aragonese domination, whose cavalry drew from equine heritage of the island to strengthen their own army or to make a gift to the other sovereigns of Europe.[63] Today the Island boasts the highest number of horse herds in Italy.[64]

There is little fishing (and no real maritime tradition), Portoscuso tunas are exported worldwide, but primarily to Japan. The cork district, in the northern part of the Gallura region, around Calangianus and Tempio Pausania, is composed of 130 companies. Every year in Sardinia 200,000 quintals of cork are carved, and 40% of the end products are exported.

In Sardinia is located the DASS (Distretto Aerospaziale della Sardegna), a consortium of companies, research centers and universities focused on aerospace industry and research.[68][69][70]

Plans related to industrial conversion are is in progress in the main industrial sites, like in Porto Torres, where seven research centres are developing the transformation from traditional fossil fuel related industry to an integrated production chain from vegetable oil using oleaginous seeds to bio-plastics.matrica green chemicals[71][72]

Sardinia is involved in the industrial production of the AirPod, an innovative car powered by compressed air, with the first factory being built in Bolotana.[73][74][75][76]

Tertiary

The Sardinian economy is today focused on the overdeveloped tertiary sector (67.8% of employment), with commerce, services, information technology, public administration and especially on tourism (mainly balnear tourism), which represents the main industry of the island with 2,721 active companies and 189,239 rooms. In 2008 there were 2,363,496 arrivals (up 1.4% on 2007). In the same year, the airports of the island registered 11,896,674 passengers (up 1.24% on 2007).[77]

Communications

On the island are headquartered some telecommunication companies and internet service providers, such as Tiscali and the Mediterranean Skylogic Teleport, a ground station controlled by satellite provider Eutelsat.[78] Sardinia is after Valle D'Aosta the Italian region with the highest e-intensity index [79][80] (Index that measures the relative maturity of Internet economies on the basis of three factors: enablement, engagement, and expenditure) and the region with the highest internet performances, such as fastest broadband connection in Italy.[81]

Sardinia has become Europe’s first region to fully adopt the new Digital Terrestrial Television broadcasting standard. From 1 November 2008 TV channels are broadcast only in digital.[82]

Meridiana is an airline based in the airport of Olbia; it was founded as Alisarda in 1963 by the Aga Khan IV. The development of Alisarda followed the development of Costa Smeralda in the north east part of the island, a well known vacation spot among billionaires and movie stars worldwide.

Public transportbuses reach every town and village at least once a day; however, due to the low density of population, the smallest territories are reachable only by car. The Azienda Regionale Sarda Trasporti (Arst) is the public regional bus transport agency. Networks of city buses serve the main towns.

Railways

The Sardinian railway system was developed starting from the 19th century by the Welsh engineer Benjamin Piercy.

Today there are two different railway operators:

Trenitalia which connects the most populated towns, the main ports, and also the Italian peninsula through the use of train ferries. This network is the most modern on the island, running primarily diesel locomotives such as the Alstom Minuetto and, from 2015 the faster tilting trainCAF ATR365, specifically designed for the Sardinian railway network;[85]

With a population density of 69/km2, slightly more than a third of the national average, Sardinia is the fourth least populated region in Italy. In the recent past the population distribution was anomalous compared to that of other Italian regions lying on the sea. In fact, contrary to the general trend, most urban settlement, with the exception of the fortified cities of Cagliari, Alghero, Castelsardo and few others, has not taken place primarily along the coast but in the subcoastal areas and towards the centre of the island. Historical reasons for this include the repeated Saracen raids during the Middle Ages and then Barbary raids until the early 19th century (making the coast unsafe), widespread pastoral activities inland, and the swampy nature of the coastal plains (reclaimed definitively only in the 20th century). The situation has been reversed with the expansion of seaside tourism; today all Sardinia's major urban centres are located near the coasts, while the island's interior is very sparsely populated.

It is the Italian region with the lowest total fertility rate[86] (1.087 births per woman), and the region with the second-lowest birth rate.[87] Combined with the aging of population going rather fast (in 2009, people older than 65 were 18,7%), rural depopulation is quite a big issue: between 1991 and 2001, 71,4% of Sardinian villages have lost population (32 more than 20% and 115 between 10% and 20%), with over 30 of them being at risk to become ghost towns.[88] Nonetheless, the overall population has been increasing because of a considerable immigration flow, mainly from the Italian mainland, Eastern Europe (esp. Romania), Africa and Asia.

Life expectancy

Average life expectancy is 81 years (85 for women[89] and 78 for men[89]). Sardinia shares with the Japanese island of Okinawa the highest rate of centenarians in the world (22 centenarians/100,000 inhabitants). Sardinia is the first discovered Blue Zone, a demographic and/or geographic area in the world with an oversize concentration of centenarians and supercentenarians.

Foreign immigration

In 2015 there were 45,079 foreign national residents, forming 2.71% of the total Sardinian population.[90] The most represented nationalities in 2014 were :

Administrative divisions

Administrative map with local toponyms.

Until 2005, Sardinia had been divided into four provinces: Cagliari, Nuoro, Oristano and Sassari. In 2005 the Regional Council decided to create four new provinces becoming operative with the provincial elections for the Presidents and the Councils held in 2006. The four additional provinces are as follows: Carbonia-Iglesias, Medio Campidano, Ogliastra, Olbia-Tempio. A popular referendum, in 2012, has supported the abolition of the provinces and the halving of the members of regional council.

Culture

A Mamuthone and an Issohadore, traditional carnival costumes of Mamoiada

Sardinia is the only autonomous region where its special Statute uses the term popolo (people) to describe its citizens. While this formula applies even to Veneto, which unlike Sardinia is an ordinary region within the Italian Republic, the Sardinian Statute is adopted with a constitutional law. In both cases, this term has no recognized legal meaning of any differences with other Italian citizens.

Languages

Alongside Italian (Italiano), the official language throughout Italy, Sardinian (Sardu) is the most widely spoken language on the island. Sardinian is a distinct branch of the Romance language family that is virtually incomprehensible to Italian speakers: it is not, by any means, an Italian dialect[93] and it has been formally recognized as a minority language in Italy since 1997, by regional and Italian law.[94][95] The language has been influenced by Catalan, Spanish and recently Italian, while the once spoken Nuragic contributes many features to it in many ancient remnants. In 2006 the regional administration has approved the use of a standardised writing system, the so-called Limba Sarda Comuna,[96] in official acts. As a literary language, Sardinian is gaining importance, despite heated debate about the lack of a commonly acknowledged standard orthography and controversial proposed solutions to this problem.[97] The two most widely spoken forms of the language are Campidanese (Sardu Campidanesu), spoken throughout the southern half of the island, and Logudorese (Sardu Logudoresu), from the northern-central region, extending almost to the suburbs of Sassari.

Due to the Italian assimilation policies carried out since 1760[98] and the ongoing absorption into the Italian culture, over the course of time the once prevalent indigenous languages have been increasingly losing ground to Italian and the process of the currently happening language shift may eventually lead to their extinction.[99]

Literature

Music

Sardinia is home to one of the oldest forms of vocal polyphony, generally known as cantu a tenore. In 2005, Unesco classed the cantu a tenore among intangible world heritage. Several famous musicians have found it irresistible, including Frank Zappa, Ornette Coleman, and Peter Gabriel. The latter travelled to the town of Bitti in the central mountainous region and recorded the now world-famous Tenores di BittiCD on his Real World label. The guttural sounds produced in this form make a remarkable sound, similar to Tuvan throat singing. Another polyphonic style of singing, more like the Corsicanpaghjella and liturgic in nature, is found in Sardinia and is known as cantu a cuncordu.

The festival of Sant'Efisio in Cagliari

Another unique instrument is the launeddas. Three reed-canes (two of them glued together with beeswax) produce distinctive harmonies, which have their roots many thousands of years ago, as demonstrated by the bronze statuettes from Ittiri, of a man playing the three reed canes, dated to 2000 BC.

Beyond this, the tradition of cantu a chiterra (guitar songs) has its origins in town squares, when artists would compete against one another. The most famous singer of this genre are Maria Carta and Elena Ledda.

Sardinian culture is alive and well, and young people are actively involved in their own music and dancing. In 2004, BBC presenter Andy Kershaw travelled to the island with Sardinian music specialist Pablo Farba and interviewed many artists. His programme can be heard on BBC Radio 3. Sardinia has produced a number of notable jazz musicians such as Antonello Salis, Marcello Melis, and Paolo Fresu.

The main opera houses of the island are the Teatro Lirico in Cagliari and the Teatro Verdi in Sassari (soon to be replaced by the new Teatro Auditorium Comunale).

Suckling pig (porcheddu) and wild boar (sirbone) are roasted on the spit or boiled in stews of beans and vegetables, thickened with bread. Herbs such as mint and myrtle are used. Much Sardinian bread is made dry, which keeps longer than high-moisture breads. Those are baked as well, including civraxiu, coccoi pintau, a highly decorative bread and pistoccu made with flour and water only, originally meant for herders, but often served at home with tomatoes, basil, oregano, garlic and a strong cheese.[101] Traditional cheeses include pecorino sardo, pecorino romano, casizolu, ricotta and the casu marzu (notable for containing live insect larvae).

One of the most famous of foods would be ‘pane carasau’ the flat bread of Sardinia, famous for its thin crunchiness.[102] Originally the making of the bread was a hard working process whom needed three women just to do the job. This flat bread is always made by hand as it gives a different flavor the more you work the dough. After working the dough it will be rolled out in very thin circles and placed in an extremely hot stone oven where the dough will blow up into a ball shape. Once the dough achieves that state it is then removed from the oven where it is then cut into two thin sheets and stacked to go back into the oven.[103]

Basketball

Sassari is home to Dinamo Basket Sassari, the only Sardinian professional basketball club playing in the Italiana serie A (Lega A), the highest level club competition in Italian professional basketball. It was founded in 1960, and is also known as Dinamo Banco di Sardegna thanks to a long sponsorship deal with the Sardinian bank. Since its promotion in Lega A in 2010, it has been enjoying the support of fans from Sassari and all over Sardinia with full-house matches on every game played at home. Dinamo Sassari achieved the highest titles in the Italian basketball in 2015, winning the Coppa Italia, the Supercoppa and the Italian basketball championship.[104]

Vento di Sardegna (en: Wind of Sardinia)is a sailboat sponsorized by Autonomous Region of Sardinia. It skipped by Andrea Mura won the Single-Handed Trans-Atlantic Race in 2013, the Two Handed Transatlantic Race (Twostar) regatta in 2012 and the Route du Rhum.

Porto Pollo, north of Palau, is a bay often used by windsurfers and kitesurfers. The bay is divided by a thin tongue of land that separates it in an area for advanced and beginning/intermediate windsurfers. There is also a restricted area for kitesurfers. Many Italian freestyle surfers come to Porto Pollo for training and 2007 saw the finale of the freestyle pro kids Europe 2007 contest. Because of a Venturi effect between Sardinia and Corsica, western wind accelerates between the islands and creates the wind that makes Porto Pollo popular among windsurfing enthusiasts. In 2005, Aglientu, hosted the Kitesurf World Cup in the Vignola's beach.

Winter sports

Skilifts on the Bruncu Spina

Four ski resorts are located on the Gennargentu Range at Separadorgiu, Monte Spada, S'Arena and Bruncu Spina, they are equipped with ski schools, skilifts and ski equipment hire.[105]

Traditional sports

S'Istrumpa, also known as Sardinian Wrestling, is a traditional Sardinian sport, officially recognized by the Italian National Olympic Committee (C.O.N.I.) and the International Federation of Celtic Wrestling (I.F.C.W.).[106] It shows similarities with the Scottish Backhold and the gouren. Istrumpa's wrestlers participate annually at the championships for Celtic wrestling stiles.

Sardinia boasts ancient equestrian traditions and is the Italian region with the highest number of horse riders (29% of population) [107] and boasts also fine darts tradition, which many believe originated in the Sassari region of the country towards the end of the 15th century. In those days, the darts were carved from beech (fagus) wood and the flights were feathers drawn from the indigenous pollo sultano (‘sultana bird’), famed for its spectacular violet-blue plumage.

Environment

The island has some environmental laws. Following an enormous reforestation plan it has become the Italian region with the largest forest extension. The 50% of the territory is covered by forested areas, 1,213,250 hectares (12,132 km2).[108][109] The Corpo forestale e di vigilanza ambientale della Regione Sarda is the Sardinian Forestry Corps. Sardinia is the Italian region most affected by forest fires during the summer.

The Regional Landscape Plan prohibits new building activities on the coast (except in urban centers), next to forests, lakes or other environmental or cultural sites and the Coastal conservation agency ensures the protection of natural areas on the Sardinian coast.

Sardinia has four endemic subspecies of birds found nowhere else in the world: its great spotted woodpecker (ssp harterti), great tit (ssp ecki), common chaffinch (ssp sarda), and Eurasian jay (ssp ichnusae). It also shares a further 10 endemic subspecies of bird with Corsica. In some cases Sardinia is a delimited part of the species range. For example, the subspecies of hooded crow, Corvus cornix ssp cornix occurs in Sardinia and Corsica, but no further south.[112]

Conversely, Sardinia lacks many common species such as the viper, the wolf, the bear and the marmot, which are found on the European continent.

The island has also long been used for grazing flocks of indigenous Sardinian sheep. The Sardinian Anglo-Arab is a horse breed that was established in Sardinia, where it has been selectively bred for more than one hundred years.

Tracey Heatherington. Wild Sardinia: Indigeneity and the Global Dreamtimes of Environmentalism (2010) 314 pages;Examines the clash between conservation efforts and traditional commons; focuses on resistance in the town of Orgosolo to Gennargentu National Park.